The present invention relates generally to the field of drawer guides, and more particularly to a self-positioning cabinet rail for a drawer guide.
Various types of pull-out drawer guides have been used in furniture such as cabinets, desks and the like for supporting drawers and similar moveable structures for many years. One such type of drawer guide has cabinet rails mountable to a furniture article and pull-out rails carrying the moveable structure, both of which are provided with rollers. The pull-out rail may support a drawer, a bin, a board or the like, and the respective rollers enable the pull-out guide and carried structure to be moved freely and without resistance between a forward, open position and a rearward, closed position.
Typically, this type of drawer guide includes a U-shaped cabinet rail and a Z-shaped pull-out rail. The U-shaped cabinet rail is mountable to a furniture article, such as a cabinet and serves as a track on which the Z-shaped pull-out rail and supported drawer rolls in and out of the drawer opening. The cabinet rail is made by first stamping out an elongate rectangular blank from a web of sheet metal and thereafter shaping by bending the long edges to form the upper and lower legs of the U-shaped cross section. Thus, the width of the blank is determined by the required dimensions of the U-shaped cross-section, which limits the width of the front end of the cabinet rail.
One disadvantage of this type of drawer guide is that when the pull-out rail is placed on the xe2x80x9ctrackxe2x80x9d, the bottom leg of the Z-shaped pull-out rail typically extends below the lower member of the drawer opening. The result is that the bottom leg of the pull-out rail and the supported drawer do not clear the lower member of the drawer opening. Thus, it is necessary that the cabinet rail be spaced and mounted a pre-determined distance above the lower member of the drawer opening to enable the pull-out rail and supported drawer to clear it.
An approach to positioning the cabinet rail a pre-determined space above the bottom of the drawer opening is to provide a workman with a specially designed jig for pre-drilling holes for screws or the like for mounting the cabinet rail at the correct pre-determined distance. Alternatively, a workman can use a separate spacer which is placed between the cabinet rail and lower member of the drawer opening while mounting the cabinet rail to the cabinet to ensure that the proper spacing is attained. However, either solution is costly and time consuming.
Another solution is to make the entire front end of the cabinet rail wider by a distance equal to the required space so that aligning the bottom of the front end of the cabinet rail with the lower member of the drawer opening provides the required spacing. Although conceivably the blank of sheet metal could be stamped out in irregular shape with a wider end or perhaps trimmed that way, this approach requires altering the current specifications for making the cabinet rails, and the cost in wasted sheet metal alone is enormous.
An additional approach made known in U.S. Pat. No. 5,722,749, incorporated herein by this reference, is for the cabinet rail to include a downwardly bent projection for spacing the cabinet rail from the bottom of the drawer opening, which requires costly and time consuming additional steps in making the rail. In still another approach made known in U.S. Pat. No. 5,876,103, incorporated herein by this reference, the projection is not bent, but rather the projection extends parallel to the cabinet rail and has an extension member of resilient or semiresilient material disposed on the projection to space the cabinet rail from the bottom of the drawer opening. This approach not only increases the time and expense of making the rail, but also involves mounting an additional component.
It is a feature and advantage of the present invention to provide a self-positioning cabinet rail for a drawer guide that is relatively inexpensive to produce and easy to mount at a predetermined position within a cabinet.
It is another feature and advantage of the present invention to provide a self-positioning cabinet rail for a drawer guide of the type having a U-shaped cabinet rail and Z-shaped pull-out rail, which includes an inexpensive, readily accessible means for positioning the cabinet rail above the bottom of the drawer opening such that a supported drawer easily moves in and out of the drawer opening.
To achieve the stated and other features, advantages and objects, an embodiment of the present invention provides a cabinet rail assembly for supporting a drawer in a drawer opening of a furniture article including a pair of cabinet rails adapted to be mounted within opposite sides of the drawer opening. Each cabinet rail has a generally U-shaped cross section with a web portion disposed between upper and lower ledges, a front end portion with front and bottom edges, and a rotatable cabinet rail roller mounted on the front end portion. Each pair of cabinet rails includes a left-hand side cabinet rail and a right-hand side cabinet rail, each adapted to receive a corresponding drawer pull-out rail having a generally Z-shaped cross section. The cabinet rails are each provided with a projection on the bottom edge of the front end portion that extends a predetermined distance below the bottom edge of the front end portion which is adapted to space the bottom edge of the cabinet rail by the pre-determined distance above a bottom member of the drawer opening.
In an embodiment of the present invention, the cabinet rails are made by first stamping out a blank from a web of sheet metal and shaping the blank to form the U-shaped cross section of each cabinet rail. In order to conserve steel, the elongate blanks are stamped out in pairs for a left-hand cabinet rail and a right hand cabinet rail, with a generally S-shaped cut defining the projections. Thus, the projection on the front end of a left-hand cabinet rail is formed from a corresponding notch on the front end of a right-hand cabinet rail and vice versa. Therefore, the projection on one of the cabinet rails is spaced a further distance from the front edge of the cabinet rail than the projection on the other of the cabinet rails. In addition, the projection on the front end portion of each of the cabinet rails corresponds to the notch in the front end portion of the other of the cabinet rails. Further, the projection on the front end portion of each of the cabinet rails is positioned adjacent the notch, which together with the projection, defines a generally S-shaped perimeter of the projection and adjacent notch.
Additional novel features, advantages and objects of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will become more apparent to those skilled in the art upon examination of the following, or may be learned by practice of the invention.